Yoga as philosophy and religion

by Surendranath Dasgupta

II. The cause of the pains has been removed and nothing further remains to be removed of it. This is the second stage or aspect of the rise of prajñā.

III. The nature of the extinction of pain has already been perceived by me in the state of samādhi, so that I have come to learn that the final extinction of my pain will be something like it.

IV. The final discrimination of prakṛti and purusha, the true and immediate means of the extinction of pain, has been realised.

After this stage, nothing remains to be done by the purusha himself. For this is the attainment of final true knowledge. It is also called the para vairāgya. It is the highest consummation, in which the purusha has no further duties to perform. This is therefore called the kārya vimukti (or salvation depending on the endeavour of the purusha) or jīvanmukti.

After this follows the citta vimukti or the process of release of the purusha from the citta, in three stages.

V. The aspect of the buddhi, which has finally finished its services to purusha by providing scope for purusha’s experiences and release; so that it has nothing else to perform for purusha. This is the first stage of the retirement of the citta.

VI. As soon as this state is attained, like the falling of stones thrown from the summit of a hill, the guṇas cannot remain even for a moment to bind the purusha, but at once return back to their primal cause, the prakṛti; for the avidyā being rooted out, there is no tie or bond which can keep it connected with purusha and make it suffer changes for the service of purusha. All the purushārthatā being ended, the guṇas disappear of themselves.

VII. The seventh and last aspect of the guṇas is that they never return back to bind purusha again, their teleological purpose being fulfilled or realised. It is of course easy to see that, in these last three stages, purusha has nothing to do; but the guṇas of their own nature suffer these backward modifications and return back to their own primal cause and leave the purusha kevalī (for ever solitary). Vyāsa-bhāshya, II. 15.

Vyāsa says that as the science of medicine has four divisions: (1) disease, (2) the cause of disease, (3) recovery, (4) medicines; so this Yoga philosophy has also four divisions, viz.: (I) Saṃsāra (the evolution of the prakṛti in connection with the purusha). (II) The cause of saṃsāra. (III) Release. (IV) The means of release.

Of these the first three have been described at some length above. We now direct our attention to the fourth. We have shown above that the ethical goal, the ideal to be realised, is absolute freedom or kaivalya, and we shall now consider the line of action that must be adopted to attain this goal—the summum bonum. All actions which tend towards the approximate realisation of this goal for man are called kuśala, and the man who achieves this goal is called kuśalī. It is in the inherent purpose of prakṛti that man should undergo pains which include all phenomenal experiences of pleasures as well, and ultimately adopt such a course of conduct as to avoid them altogether and finally achieve the true goal, the realisation of which will extinguish all pains for him for ever. The motive therefore which prompts a person towards this ethico-metaphysical goal is the avoidance of pain. An ordinary man feels pain only in actual pain, but a Yogin who is as highly sensitive as the eye-ball, feels pain in pleasure as well, and therefore is determined to avoid all experiences, painful or so-called pleasurable. The extinguishing of all experiences, however, is not the true ethical goal, being only a means to the realisation of kaivalya or the true self and nature of the purusha. But this means represents the highest end of a person, the goal beyond which all his duties cease; for after this comes kaivalya which naturally manifests itself on the necessary retirement of the prakṛti. Purusha has nothing to do in effectuating this state, which comes of itself. The duties of the purusha cease with the thorough extinguishing of all his experiences. This therefore is the means of extinguishing all his pains, which are the highest end of all his duties; but the complete extinguishing of all pains is identical with the extinguishing of all experiences, the states or vṛttis of consciousness, and this again is identical with the rise of prajñā or true discriminative knowledge of the difference in nature of prakṛti and its effects from the purusha—the unchangeable. These three sides are only the three aspects of the same state which immediately precede kaivalya. The prajñā aspect is the aspect of the highest knowledge, the suppression of the states of consciousness or experiences, and it is the aspect of the cessation of all conscious activity and of painlessness or the extinguishing of all pains as the feeling aspect of the same nirvīja—samādhi state. But when the student directs his attention to this goal in his ordinary states of experience, he looks at it from the side of the feeling aspect, viz. that of acquiring a state of painlessness, and as a means thereto he tries to purify the mind and be moral in all his actions, and begins to restrain and suppress his mental states, in order to acquire this nirvīja or seedless state. This is the sphere of conduct which is called Yogāṅga.